This disclosure relates generally to the field of image manipulation. More particularly, but not by way of limitation, it relates to techniques for enhancing and repairing images using data from other images.
Photography has been an innovative field since the earliest crude photographs were produced, developing from camera obscura and pinhole cameras to chemically-developed film cameras in the 19th century to digital cameras in the late 20th century. With digital photography has come an ability to manipulate images, providing capabilities not practical or possible with film. Individuals may easily create or collect libraries of thousands of digital images, using software to organize and manipulate images in those libraries. In addition to standalone imaging devices such as traditional cameras, imaging devices are now ubiquitous in a wide variety of other devices, including smartphones and tablet computers.
However, as any photographer knows, not every photograph is a good one. Sometimes the photograph includes an image of a person whose face is blocked, blurry, or whose eyes were closed when the photograph was taken. Sometimes the image may show a spot or temporary blemish on the person's nose or somewhere else visible in the image.
Other times, a photographer may take a picture at some location and for some reason the photograph was taken with an incorrect exposure setting or out of focus, or the photographer inadvertently moved the camera while taking the photograph. Sometimes a photograph may contain some blurry object, such as a random person walking the camera and the subject of the photograph just as the photograph was taken.
While image manipulation techniques exist that may be used to manipulate areas of a photograph, such as the ability to remove the “red-eye” effect when using a photographic flash unit caused by reflection of light by the person's eyes. Other techniques have allowed cloning tools or healing brush tools that use sample data from other points on the photograph to correct imperfections, causing them to blend with the surrounding area of the image. While useful, these existing tools are not always capable of repairing or correcting a photograph as much as would be desired.